Girls Basketball: T.F. North zeroes in on Oak Forest

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Updated: March 2, 2012 8:11AM

The defense T.F. North mainly used in Tuesday night’s 52-32 South Suburban Blue victory over host Oak Forest is named “cover zero.”

To that end, Schenia Battle and Chardae Greenlee were zero heroes.

Battle’s relentless pressure netted her 10 steals. She finished with 15 points.

Greenlee had just two thefts and seven points, but was Herculean in holding Oak Forest’s deadliest shooter, Katie Swanson, to five points and no field goals.

Sharee Greenlee added 13 points and Sabrina Montgomery 11 points and nine rebounds for North (14-9, 10-0), which maintained its spot at the top of the Red Division with T.F. South.

Oak Forest (14-9, 8-2) was led by Kelly McEathron (9 points) and Lauren Bal (12 rebounds).

The Bengals drew first blood on a three-pointer by McEathron and opened up a 7-2 lead, but T.F. North fired back with a 12-2 run to end the first quarter and rolled from there.

The Meteors beat Oak Forest at one of its specialties, as Sharee Greenlee had three treys and Battle another, but it was their defense that really bottled up the Bengals.

“Basically, you forget about the inbounder and jump on the person taking the inbound and trap,” Battle said of their defensive strategy. “I was just thinking, ‘Go to the ball.’ ”

During one stretch late in the first period Battle picked a Bengal pocket three times in four possessions. At the other end they resulted in her own driving layup, a three-point play by Chardae Greenlee and a putback by Montgomery.

It was 30-14 at halftime and 42-26 after three periods. Oak Forest simply couldn’t build any kind of offensive momentum against its toughest defensive opponent this season.

“I think the entire game, absolutely,” Bengals coach Steve Schanz said. “And the thing is, we played Rich South and Crete-Monee, which had good defenses as well. We should have been more ready for it.

“The real difference was they had four players ready to step up.”